Running on empty

God it was nice to have a rainless day today. We in DC are so soggy; mushrooms, those fungal lovers of humid wetness, are sprouting everywhere like Jon Hamm's beard ten minutes after he shaves. Every morning this past week, I've had to drain various pots on my deck as the flowers within weren't meant to grow hydroponically. It's all very swampy to say the least.

Our beautiful Jack turned nine yesterday morning, and we celebrated all day. Berries and whipped cream for breakfast, a fair amount of Indiana Jones Wii during the morning storm, a race to play mini-golf as the skies cleared around lunchtime. A good mini-golf course is such fun, and I got two holes in one, but who counted. 

Back home to prep for an early-evening dinner and party with Tom's parents. The kids are really lucky to be growing up near grandparents; I am still grateful for having lived so close to Nanny and Papa.  

We had flank steak and corn, cucumber and dill salad, and the ice cream cake that took two days to craft: vanilla ice cream, some sort of chocolate cookie with two chocolate sauces thing, mint chocolate chip ice cream, cream frosting. 

Jack was thrilled with everything and ate like a horse and then, bless his heart, he said he was too tired to stay up for fireworks and could we go another year. Uh, yes!

Today was long, y'all. Not bad but a real marathon. As it comes to a close, I find myself hoping desperately that family life starts to feel easier at some point. That the intensity lessens so that we can all breathe as much as we need to and when. 

I recognize that the boys' curious, spirited, joyful natures are gifts. Those qualities are the fires that will propel them to live large and expansively, to care deeply about and stand for things, to love and learn and make the world a brighter place. And I am grateful for all of that. But I also shrug, pretty much daily, under the weight of parenting it all; of reining them in and pushing them out. Of steering and guiding and molding and tending. Of deciding and supporting and being there always. 

On Tuesday, I fly them down to Louisiana for the annual Big Boys Week. I'll stay through Saturday and then return home alone. That departure is always difficult. What if something happened? Won't the house be quiet! What if they need me? 

But I also know how very much I need and am lucky to get this break. That life is hard enough without coasting into bed each night on nothing more than fumes. That one day when they move away, I will be happy that I tended to my marriage and own identity during these years, even though I sometimes feel I'm only doing those things minimally and on little more than vapor.

Go USA Women's Soccer!!!

Okra and the 4th

So I realized last night that in my crisper drawer were the okra that T bought last Sunday. So fresh were they when purchased that they'd maintained their proud shape and verdant green hue. No need to risk missing the window: part of dinner they would be!

Do y'all know what okra love? Not gumbo, but bacon! Okra smothered in bacon drippings? 

There is NO slime in well-prepared okra: fried, smothered, grilled... Don't wash before cooking, and you're in great shape. 

So last night: bacon, okra, corn and more bacon. Delicious!

And watermelon and feta and watercress. And tomatoes and pea tendrils and blue cheese. And bourbon shrubs. And there you have it. 

I freaking love okra. Love it.

Today I spent large swaths of time either running (6.25 miles; legs now crying) or putting together the three-layer ice cream cake Jack requested for his birthday. My oldest baby turns 9 in the morning, and I just can't believe it. I mean, I can, but at the same time, wow. 

He does not like regular cake, and I enjoy learning something new each year as I make a new, celebratory, non-cake dessert.

Let me tell you the main thing I've learned so far: do NOT make your own Oreos. Accept the fake-o, chemical shit in the Nabisco ones and love them. They are the best. By far.

Tom bought Jack an inexpensive drone for his birthday and is playing with it right now like he's a seven-year-old who just received the most awesome thing IN THE WHOLE WORLD. It is crashing repeatedly into the windows, and the pets are vexed out of their minds. Men = boys = always kids.

Happy almost-4th, y'all!

Mother as starfish

Today I felt like a starfish on the rack. Pulled in all directions from each limb to the point at which bloody rips started to show.

I changed a little one’s PJs near midnight last night and then took him down to the basement to sleep. We laughed over silly things until I averred that seriously, bedtime was long ago.

I felt a gentle tug on my foot at 4 am. The other one had woken up and wanted me. “Please go back to bed, honey. It’s 4 am.” Later, we had to drag him from his cocoon to get to camp on time.

There were so many tears and so much drama before 9 am. Everyone up but unrested, tired and acting it. I thought to myself, “And I imagined ‘boys’ meant I sidestepped this emotionality,” before nodding back into the present and realizing it didn’t mean that at all. It simply means emotionality shows itself differently, and while it often drives me crazy, it’s no more or less valid and should be both reined in and nurtured.

Back home, I intervened in our dying dishwasher’s cleaning cycle to manually release the detergent tab. I walked Percy, urging him ever-forward on a longer path because I had to snap a picture of our neighborhood church’s sign. It makes me happy and proud and hopeful.

There was so much laundry and so many dishes and the unread email list vastly outnumbered the reads. There were messages to return, a birthday cake recipe to print, a lunch to shower and ready for, a meeting to attend. I was alerted by Facebook's notification flag so many times I went dark, fleeing from all social media except for the blissfully quiet Instagram which is just a whole bunch of pretty on scroll.

And the fruit flies. Oh, the fruit flies. It is peak season for their annual migration into our fruit-filled kitchen. I hate their gnattiness and while I pride myself on being a hell of a fruit fly assassin, their numbers are too great this year, and I’m swarmed.

My meeting ran three minutes late, and I found Oliver outside on the camp steps –mere feet from where I was and where the camp heads should have told him I sat- looking heartbroken and terrified: was I ever going to arrive? His lip was trembling, and I ran to him, scooped him up and asked what I could do. Flummoxed, which made it all worse, he said he didn’t know. Cupcakes? Fro-yo? The bookstore? “I just don’t know, Mama.” Oh, my heart.

I took him to Fancy Cakes and purchased a fancy cupcake which he devoured gleefully. He eyed the case again, and guilt-ridden and wild with love, I bought a second cupcake. 75% of the way through, “Mama, I don’t feel so good.” Dumb mom.

Home to read stories and drink fizzy water, and the laundry. So much of it. Pokemon and tears over a poor Energy Card decision. I think, can’t you just listen to me read to you or play with blocks? Why aren’t kids just kids anymore? Or was it always this way.

Back out to pick Jack up at his big-kid camp at a local university. Come to find Days of Our Lives was on the cafeteria TV and he saw a sex scene. He’s not yet nine. I was upset but stayed calm and asked, “Well, honey, do you have any questions? Do you feel OK?” I emailed the director asking her –telling her- to make sure the damn TV is OFF or at least on age-appropriate programming. I tell her, “My son has never seen this before, but now he has.” Via Days of Our fucking Lives. #NOTreallife

More overtired tears shed over the ban on dessert after dinner because the cupcakes and the fresh jelly donut I bought yesterday just for Jack and wrapped carefully and packed in his lunch box just so. “You are SO unfair, Mom!” is thrown in my face, and I think to myself, “fuck this spoiled attitude!” while also thinking, “What a tired little boy he is. I’m glad I’m here for him.” while also thinking, “Hell, it’d be nice to not be here right now.”

I ask for the Energy Cards back because “y’all cannot talk to me or each other in the manner that you are” and then get major attitude from one about bath time while the other, always thrilled to get naked, undresses but then just wants us to observe his bottom.

I think they get clean, I brush their teeth, tuck one in, listen as the one who refused to finish dinner (which of course I’ve put away) tells me that he is now starving and wants it back. The dog, cat, washing machine, phone. They are ALL talking. And look at me, still in a dress and swingy necklace from lunch. Who am I kidding? Was that even today?

The little one says he might “fwhoa up and can I please have a Tums?” “What a good idea, darling, and how about some fizzy water too.”

The big one says, “Mom, can we do the puzzle together because I love to do things with you,” and I say, “Sure honey, you are always so good at finding the confusing pieces.”

And I’m so glad I’m here although I often want to be there, and isn’t that just the thing about parenthood.

Looks like a hug

Finally, they are in bed. I think for good. My starfish arms have freed and are retracting themselves, some good cheese, a watermelon and spicy watercress salad and a bourbon shrub eased the rest. Tom called, “I’m going to be late.” And I said, “Baby, that is A-OK.”